1. Technical Field
The present disclosure relates generally to a general-purpose vehicle remote control device and method and, more particularly, to a general-purpose vehicle remote control device and method that are capable of remotely controlling a vehicle over a distance longer than the operating distance of a conventional bidirectional remote start device.
2. Description of the Related Art
The demand for remote starters and alarms has gradually increased in pursuit of convenient and safe vehicle management. With the diversification of the use of smartphones, it is possible to remotely control vehicles or check the states of vehicles in real time using smartphones. Remote starters and alarms for vehicles have been commercialized in the form of various products ranging from a product having the functions of opening and closing the door of a vehicle and remotely starting a vehicle via unidirectional communication to a product capable of preventing a vehicle from being stolen and checking the state of a vehicle via bidirectional communication. Common remote starters and alarms may be classified into AM type devices using a frequency of 311 MHz and FM type devices using a frequency of 447 MHz according to their communication frequency, and may be classified into unidirectional type devices and bidirectional type devices according to their communication direction as described above. Among these devices, devices using smartphones enable users to remotely start their vehicles and to check the states of their vehicles using smartphones anytime and anywhere because the vehicles are equipped with the function of communicating with the smartphones.
Remote vehicle-related services include remote vehicle start/stop, remote door closing and opening, and remote trunk closing and opening. Recently, a wireless control vehicle (Su Rui produced by BYD company of China) that can be remotely driven using a dedicated remote control over a distance within 10 m has been commercialized. Although this wireless remote control vehicle has a maximum hourly speed of 2 km/h when it is driven using a remote control, it provides convenience that eliminates the need to walk to the vehicle when a driver parks the vehicle or when it is raining. The remote control provides an intuitive interface based on door closing and opening function buttons and a touch pad, thereby enabling anybody to easily use remote control functions.
However, since the above conventional remote starters and alarms can work within a distance close to a vehicle, they cannot be used to remotely control a vehicle parked in a parking lot from an office of a tall building or a apartment house and also it is difficult to check the state of a vehicle using them. In order to resolve this problem, the present invention presents general-purpose remote control technology that enables a user to control his or her vehicle located at a remote location.
As a related preceding technology, Korean Patent Application Publication No. 10-2012-0063771 discloses a remote vehicle start system.